Former judge accuses DA Brooke Jenkins of hostility toward judges in State Bar complaint
A former judge who has clashed with San Francisco District Attorney Brooke Jenkins over her forceful criticism of local judges has filed a complaint with the State Bar accusing Jenkins of showing 'outspoken disrespect' to the city's judges, leading to 'an atmosphere of hostility.'
'District Attorney Brooke Jenkins' incendiary attacks on San Francisco's judiciary are anathema to judicial independence' and 'jeopardize the safety of our judges,' LaDoris Hazard Cordell, a retired Superior Court judge in Santa Clara County, said in an attorney misconduct complaint to the bar last week.
Jenkins' office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But last month, after Cordell first asserted that Jenkins had acted improperly, the district attorney accused the former judge — an outspoken critic of the U.S. Supreme Court's conservative majority — of 'hypocritical hand-wringing' for decrying her criticisms of local judges.
'As San Francisco District Attorney it is my responsibility, and right, to share with the public the facts around what happens in criminal cases,' Jenkins said. 'Although some judges on the bench may not like transparency around their decisions, San Franciscans have asked for, expect and deserve to know what is happening at the courthouse.'
The State Bar took disciplinary action against Jenkins several weeks ago, sending her to a diversion program for ethics training. The action was in response to complaints that she had improperly shared a confidential report of a defendant's criminal record and that she had misrepresented herself as a volunteer in the successful 2022 recall campaign against her predecessor, Chesa Boudin. Jenkins later disclosed that she earned more than $120,000 as a consultant for three nonprofits tied to the effort — pay she said was unrelated to her work on the recall.
The State Bar did not reach a formal decision on whether Jenkins did anything wrong in those matters. It said it found evidence that Jenkins improperly accessed or handled the rap sheet, but would have trouble proving misconduct at a disciplinary hearing.
Jenkins was a prosecutor in Boudin's office but resigned in October 2021 to join the recall campaign, which accused Boudin of being too lenient to criminal defendants. Mayor London Breed appointed her to succeed Boudin after the recall, and she was elected to a new four-year term last November.
Cordell, a Santa Clara County judge from 1982 to 2001, later served as San Jose's independent police auditor, then was appointed by Boudin to San Francisco's Innocence Commission, which examines inmates' claims of wrongful convictions and recommends actions to the district attorney. She remained on the commission after Jenkins took office but resigned in March, citing the district attorney's increasing criticism of local judges.
In her resignation notice and her complaint to the State Bar, Cordell quoted Jenkins' assertion in February that a 'majority' of San Francisco judges 'do not treat drug dealing as a serious crime despite repeat offenses.'
After Superior Court Judge Gerardo Sandoval issued a misdemeanor sentence in January 2025 for a minor theft by a man who had previous felony convictions, Cordell noted, Jenkins said Sandoval had ignored 'the clear will of the voters' who passed Proposition 36 in November, allowing felony prison sentences in such cases, and that the sentence 'epitomizes the broken laissez-faire culture at the Hall of Justice.'
She said in another case that judges were allowing criminals 'to use this courthouse as a revolving door.' And when Superior Court Judge Kay Tsenin issued a suspended sentence to a mentally ill man who had stabbed an elderly Asian American woman, releasing him after 2 ½ years in jail while requiring five years of treatment, Jenkins joined an angry protest outside Tsenin's courthouse.
'Jenkins' outspoken disrespect to the San Francisco judiciary has contributed to an atmosphere of public hostility against the Court,' Cordell said in her State Bar complaint. 'Judges are not immune from criticism. However, there is a difference between criticizing a judge's ruling and personally attacking the judge and smearing an entire judiciary.'
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